THE INCREDIBLE HULK Must 'Stay Angry' Starting in May

Update: The Hulk has to "stay angry" starting in May, and he's got Punisher, Wolverine and Kraven the Hunter to help him along.

Announced Wednesday during Marvel's latest "Next Big Thing" conference call with the comic book press, the "Stay Angry" arc starts with May's Incredible Hulk #8, from series writer Jason Aaron and his Punishermax collaborator Steve Dillon. A different artist will illustrate each part of the five-issue arc, with Pasqual Ferry on board for #9, and the rest to be revealed — though Aaron noted that other than Dillon, it's all artists he hasn't worked with before. At this time, there are no plans for Marc Silvestri to return to the title, Marvel confirmed with Newsarama.
Aaron noted that it's a sharp turn to go from working with Dillon on Punishermax to The Incredible Hulk, but he enjoys the change of pace.
"It's pretty awesome," Aaron said. "To have him
jump on the Hulk is like a crazy shift of gears, but again, that's the
kind of stuff that gets me excited."
It's a smoother transition than one might guess, as the Punisher guest stars in #8, with Hulk and Frank Castle up against what Aaron dubbed "whacked-out Mexican drug lords." Wolverine and Kraven show up in future chapters, and Aaron said readers can expect a "huge shift of setting from issue to issue."
"I'm trying to make this the most frenetic and crazy thing I've ever written," Aaron said, comparing it to the Jason Statham-starred Crank movies.
Aaron has a lot of experience writing Punisher and Wolverine, but acknowledged that he's never gotten to write Kraven the Hunter before. Aaron called '80s Spider-Man story "Kraven's Last Hunt" one of his "desert island" Marvel books, and that the character's portrayal will be consistent with recent appearances in Amazing Spider-Man.
After Hulk and Bruce Banner have already been through the upheaval of being mysteriously split apart at the start of Aaron's run on Incredible Hulk, the writer said that readers can expect another new status quo for the Hulk as of the "Stay Angry" arc.
"Incredible Hulk #1 came out with a brand new dynamic for Hulk and Banner, that gets tweaked again with issue #7," Aaron said.
Full details from the conference call can be found in the Cover it Live box below.
Original story: It's time once again for another Marvel "Next Big Thing" conference call with the comic book press, and this one focuses on The Incredible Hulk, with the Punishermax team of Jason Aaron and Steve Dillon reuniting for the "Stay Angry" arc in May's issue #8.
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